I'm an engineer and a New York Times Bestselling Author of two books: $20 Per Gallon (2009) and Automate This (2012). I'm a cofounder at Aisle50, which was part of the Summer 2011 class at Y Combinator. Before Aisle50, Forbes was my full-time home for six years. During that time, I primarily covered the tech industry, writing cover stories on Andrew Mason and Paul Graham as well as a cover piece that prematurely proclaimed the economic recovery had arrived. I like to ski and I'm occasionally lucky enough to write about it.

The Most Undervalued Brand In The World

Most companies take their best asset and wring it for every drop of sales possible. Some take it too far, in fact, and end up diluting the very brand that built their empire. The venerable Hershey Company, maker of its eponymous chocolate and other keystone treats, has been doing the opposite, however. It’s been shielding from the world its best asset, a mightily delicious, addicting candy bar that doesn’t get its fair due from its parent company.

The Take 5 has been limited by little marketing support, a bad name and banal packaging

Let us introduce to you the ill-named, mis-marketed and diminutive masterpiece known, regretfully, as the Take 5 Bar. Oh, you’ve never heard of the Take 5? Join the club that, sadly, numbers in the billions. What kind of world do we live in that finding the prosaic and tasteless Necco Wafers at an average convenience store is far more predictable and easy than finding an exquisitely delicious Take 5 bar?

It’s sad. It’s sad for the world. And it’s especially sad for Hershey and its shareholders because the Take 5 can be and should be Hershey’s iPhone. Hershey’s stock has been an outperformer and we’re proud of the candy maker for that—but we think it can be an even bigger star.

And we know what you’re thinking: these are the words of a huckster, a pumper and dumper, somebody looking to get a big rise out of the markets tomorrow with talk of this magical candy bar. But we did our homework here. We called the heavyweights in on this. We even called Hershey.

First, let’s examine what comprises candy greatness. Like many tech companies that strike upon innovation by fusing the power of data and the web with social connectivity or ecommerce, the greatness of the Take 5 stems from a fusion of salty and sweet. The pang of saltiness comes from the sturdy foundation of a pretzel topped with a dollop of peanut butter and peanuts. From there Hershey took a leap by daring to layer caramel atop the peanut butter. And just like Jonas Salk or Gottfried Leibniz, Hershey didn’t stop at “great enough.” It brought the thunder, adding a layer of its milk chocolate—not too thick, not too thin—around the entire works.

The composition of pure genius can be seen in profile view in the schematic picture on this page. As seen here, the Take 5 bar has several masses emitting their own centers of gravity, all of them coalescing to put eaters in an orbit of happiness never before achieved by a mass-produced candy bar.

The Take 5 is a sophisticated and nuanced beast

So why doesn’t Hershey’s push this thing? Why has the Take 5 been doomed to groveling behind brands like York Peppermint Pattie and Mounds? Don’t bother going to the website for the Take 5—it doesn’t have one. Hershey’s did build a website dedicated to its so-called “Iconic Brands.” Almond Joy, apparently, is iconic. Twizzlers, iconic. Kit Kat, iconic. But the one bar that should rule them all? Not iconic, says Hershey.

This is like watching The Beatles be the first of three opening bands for Nickelback. Anybody with half an eye for talent wouldn’t let the Take 5 ride the bench while Mr. Goodbar remained in the starting lineup.

So we brought the question right to Hershey: why bury a star?

“We agree that Take 5 candy bar is a fantastic product,” said Jeff Beckman, head of communications at Hershey. “However, as a company that is building a large portfolio of more than 80 brands around the world, we have to make decision as to which brands receive marketing support.”

In other words, Take 5 doesn’t get marketing support. Hershey says that it uses a “wide range of proprietary research tools and marketplace insights to understand which products best meet the evolving demands of customers.” Hershey calls its supported brands “activated.”

One of Hershey’s products that recently gained “activated” status is Rolo, which is now drawing a significant amount of advertising support for the first time since 1987—more than 25 years ago.

So here’s a brand in Rolo that is essentially a commodity—caramel covered in chocolate—stuck with a name and packaging from when Ronald Regan was president, and it’s being supported in a big way by Hershey while Take 5 lurks in the shadows, a sleeping giant.

“Many organizations fail to effectively put themselves in the minds of their customers and it would seem Hershey has drastically undervalued the reality that Take 5 bars are delicious, nutritious, sumptuous and scrumptious,” says Aaron Perlut, founding partner of digital marketing and PR firm Elasticity, who has carried out campaigns for Miller Lite, H&R Block, UPS and Papa Johns.

Even without support, Take 5 has grown on the backs of grass roots volunteers. It’s now an $11 million brand, according to Nielsen research, having grown 10% in the last 12 months. Not bad for a brand with zero marketing. Even better for Hershey: Take 5 indexes highly with households making more than $100,000—its distribution here is 89% higher than with households making less than $100,000.

“Putting it all together, Take 5 is a brand with a lot of potential—especially in more urban and affluent areas,” says Dr. Vanitha Swaminathan, a professor of marketing at the University of Pittsburgh who has cooperated on several research projects with Hershey.

Swaminathan believes that the Take 5 could benefit from social media campaign waged on the Web to reach bloggers and foodies who haven’t yet tried it. Before hearing about it from a reporter, Swaminathan had never tried the candy herself. But now she’s a big believer.

“It’s quite amazing—all of those flavors come together and really explode in your mouth,” Swaminathan says.

To be fair to Hershey, we think we know what it’s guarding against by keeping its best asset muffled beneath feeble marketing. It’s afraid. All companies, of course, are tempted to extend their best franchise into new arenas and new customer pools. This can work: Patagonia’s pricey outerwear was once the sole province of mountain folk and hippies, but it now occupies space in 50% of Manhattan closets.

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